


every night i burn, every night i fall again.

by crystallinedewdrops



Category: DCU, DCU (Comics), The Authority
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Rape Recovery, description of panic attacks, fuck mark millar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-04
Updated: 2018-04-04
Packaged: 2019-04-18 07:54:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14208618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crystallinedewdrops/pseuds/crystallinedewdrops
Summary: Floating in space with the burning sun in front of him, Mercury and Venus behind him, the stars, the universe, all around him, he thought of the people in his life, the people who depend on him, who need his help, and then he thought of the story of Hyacinth.Apollo, the man. Apollo, the Sun King.He would die first before letting anyone get hurt.





	every night i burn, every night i fall again.

**Author's Note:**

> honestly, fuck mark millar for using trauma as shock value. this takes place during the authority days.

He wished he could say he doesn’t remember what happened to him that day, but he does. There were days where it was so overwhelming that all he wanted to do was shut himself away until the memory stops hurting.

But he found out that it doesn’t work that way; it only makes it worse.

//

He knew the fucker was dead, but there were days where he wanted to bring him back to life just to kill him again. He wanted to break him, beat him up because back then he was powerless. It’s the reason why he doesn’t drink all that much, not after that day. But since he could not bring the man who ruined him back to life, Apollo helped those who went through what he did. That, at least, helped him even though it made him angry. No deserves to go through that, no one.

He redirected that rage and used it as a weapon. It was better than nothing.

//

He had nightmares of that day ever since he was rescued. Only Midnighter knew about that. Apollo didn’t want anyone’s pity, he just wanted it to stop hurting. He just wanted to stop feeling like everyone is out to get him. He wanted his skin to stop crawling and the discomfort from growing every time someone touched him, he wanted the paranoia and fear to go away every time someone looked at him in a certain way.

He wanted to stop feeling like he’s suffocating.

So he didn’t talk about it, repressed it, pretended he was fine. Fake it until you make it, right?

( It didn’t work, but it was something, at least, for a little while. )

//

The very first time he broke down, he was alone. His husband had been roaming the Earth at night, as he is wont to do sometimes. Apollo had woken up to an empty room, the Bleed’s unnatural colours wafting through the window, painting everything in colours unlike anything he had ever seen.

He had been fine, up until he felt like he couldn’t breath, up until the panic attack started.

And then he was crying, sobbing silently as the blunt force of the trauma hit him. He didn’t know how many hours had passed, but by the time he stopped he felt a vast emptiness where he had previously felt discomfort and suffocation.

Hollowed out, his pillow was tear stained from where he had held it over his face in hopes of quieting the sobs and noises.

Apollo found comfort in the emptiness he felt at that moment. It was better than feeling like he wanted to peel off his own skin, at the very least.

//

The breakdowns did not stop after that. They would usually come when he was alone. They would leave him feeling the same numbness, and then he was back to being himself the next day.

He found outlets in small tasks, like stacking cards over each other or painting. It helped distract him, clear his mind a little bit.

( Except in the times it did not, those were the worst. )

//

Midnighter woke him up from a nightmare. He ran cold hands through his hair. Midnighter helped him calm down, helped him come back down from the nightmare. Apollo’s hands unclenched, and slowly he regulated his erratic breathing to match that of the man holding him, calm and steady.

They both lay there, holding each other tightly. With his head on the other’s chest, Apollo listened to the beating of his husband’s hearts, a sound he would forever recognize. A sound that reassured him in ways words sometimes cannot.

Midnighter continued running his hands through his sweat-soaked hair, gently rubbing his back. Apollo knew that he couldn’t go back to sleep, but he also didn’t want to talk.

“Say something.” It came out as a whisper, because he couldn’t bring himself to raise his voice any louder. He feared if he spoke any more than a few words, he wouldn’t be able to keep the walls he had built from breaking. He hadn’t distanced himself from his lover, but he also hadn’t told him about it. 

A beat of silence. 

“What do you want me to say?”

“Anything would help…” _Please._

The pleading in he hears in his own voice threatened to break him. An ugly feeling spread through him at that moment, a feeling he had become familiar with the past few months. Self-loathing only hit when at times like these, when his thoughts were too loud for him to handle.

A grunt, a deep breath, another beat of silence passed before Midnighter began talking about anything and everything. Apollo focused on that hoarse, deep voice and let his thoughts become static at the back of his mind.

They stayed like that until the call for the next mission came. That helped him as well. 

( Helping others was much more important than helping himself, at that moment. )

//

There were days where he pretended it didn’t happen to him, that he was not violated in such a way; it helps, the fantasies. It gave him something to focus his anger on. Reminded him of why he wanted to fight for a finer world.

Because there were days where he was too far gone in his head, to the point where he stopped going on missions just to stay close to the sun. Overwhelmed and detached at the same time, there were days where he would spend hours watching the sun, the planets, the stars, and wanting to disappear. Wanting his atoms to disperse through the vastness before him so he would belong to the stars, to the universe, instead of belonging to himself.

There were days where it became too much, being on the Carrier, being around people. Out there, in space with the stars, comets, and planets, he was only overwhelmed by the vast silence. Somehow, it was comforting.

( Isolation, while comforting for a while, is never a good thing. )

//

That unfortunate day still haunted him, the day where he knew that Bendix had fucked them over, the day he knew he was expendable to someone. He started focusing more on the missions, on the well being of others, of his team, and less on himself. Of course he didn’t notice the signs.

The trauma hit him again, but this time during a briefing.

He clenched his fist, and tried to breath only to find that he couldn’t. It felt like there was a weight on his chest and shoulders, threatening to crush him. He tried to focus on the voices of the others and found that he couldn’t because of the blood pounding in his ears. He tried focusing on the heartbeats of the one person who knew him so well, and found that he could not.

_Choking, suffocating—_

A hand landed on his arm, gentle in ways that he would always be familiar with. Moving his own hand, he grasped that black-gloved hand in his own, and let Midnighter lead him away from the others. He didn’t know how long they had walked, he didn’t even know where he was.

_Choking, choking, choking–_

Cold fingers reached to touch his face, so gentle and soft despite the callouses. He leant into the touch, eyes shut tightly to stop the tears from running, to stop himself from breaking.

_Not now, anytime but now, he couldn’t afford it now—_

Arms wrapped around his shoulders and he was pulled into that solid body that he knew even better than he knew his own. Fingers ran through his hair, his head on Midnighter’s shoulders. It was the gentleness with which he was held that broke the walls he built around himself.

Apollo cried. His entire body shook, trembled. He continued crying until there weren’t any tears left, until that comforting numbness came.

This time, it settled deep into his bones, felt like it was weighing him down. Tired, he was so tired. It did not register to him that he was apologizing—for what, he didn’t know, only that he needed to—until his husband hushed him.

Together they returned to their bedroom.

//

Being a father to Jenny helped, because it made him think less of what happened to him and more about the fact that she’s his daughter. His and Midnighter’s. 

During their five-years of exile and being on the run, he had fantasized about living like this: a family of him, Midnighter, and their kids; a white-picket fence dream. Then, he got that dream, except for the house. It’d be okay, though, he had them.

That’s all that mattered.

He focused on that, on raising his child right, and less about himself.

The trauma didn’t stop hitting him, but now he recognized the signs before it happened.

//

Apollo threw on a façade, acted like nothing was wrong with him. He acted a lot more reckless too, but he tried to excuse it, to justify it.

He did not need their pity.

( It wasn’t pity, but sympathy. )

//

“We need to talk.”

They were getting ready to sleep, and Apollo was already under the covers when the other man spoke. The words were chosen carefully, the tone was guarded like he was preparing for a fight, but his body betrayed all of that with the ease and nonchalance of his movement. Midnighter turned, already finished with folding his uniform—some habits are hard to break—and the expression on his face was so rare to see that Apollo couldn’t help but feel a pang in his chest.

“About what?” He already knew about what—the half-isolated state, the recklessness, the crying, and so much more, but feigned ignorance because he could not talk about it. Not now.

“What happened...” 

Something must have showed on his face, because Midnighter faltered. He rarely, if ever, did that. 

“There must be some way we could help you. Just tell me what’s wrong.”

Everything, he wanted to say. Everything’s wrong with him; the panic attacks, the breakdowns, the rage and the self-destructive recklessness, the self-loathing that keeps him awake at night and haunts him in the day. His jaw muscles tightened, and he released a breath he did not know he was holding.

“There’s nothing wrong.”

“Don’t do that.”

He suddenly felt more tired than he was, like everything was sucked out of him and all that was left was a shell of a man. 

( Isn’t that a thought. He’s just a man, but with god-like powers, named after the Greek god of healing, of light, of sickness, of plague. Phœbus Apollo. Healing, plague and sickness, two sides of the same coin. )

During his period of silence, his lover—husband, friend, the person who ever truly known him, who loves him—stepped closer and sat near him on the bed. 

“'Nighter…” 

His mouth refused to work with him, so he settled on sitting up from his position to hold him, and rested his weary head on the other man’s shoulder.

“Not now.. I just — not now…”

“Whenever. I’ll be here.” _If you need me_ went unsaid, but both men understood.

( The journey to healing, to recovery, is a very long one. )

//

Apollo, the Greek god of healing—song and music, light, prophecy, among other countless of things—had a lover. Hyacinth.

He had loved him so much that when he died, the deity had turned him into a flower to keep him alive, so that his soul would not go to the underworld. So that Thanatos cannot take him away from this world.

Apollo, the man, thought about the myth. He turned it over and over in his head. Henry Bendix had given him that name, and what had the man named after the deity done? Taken it, made it his and his alone.

Floating in space, with the burning sun in front of him, Mercury and Venus behind him, the stars, the universe, all around him, he thought of the people in his life, the people who depend on him, who need his help, and then he thought of the story of Hyacinth.

Apollo, the man. Apollo, the Sun King.

He would die first before letting anyone get hurt.

//

One day, he decided to finally tell Midnighter about it.

They’re sitting on the couch in their room, with the some show he did not particularly care about airing on TV; the room was dark, save for the colourful lights coming from the windows of the Carrier and the television right in front of them. Apollo thought of the many ways he would breach the topic, what he would say, the words he needs, and it was overwhelming. But he knows he needs to do this.

Why is he so anxious about this? He shouldn't be, the man had been there for him every step of the way.

“There is something I want to tell you..” He hates the hesitation, the nervousness, that showed clear as daylight in his voice. This is ridiculous, he really should not be feeling this way.

Midnighter turned his attention from the show to him. “What is it?”

Apollo’s stares at the TV blankly, his thoughts are a mess; part of him wants this to be over with, and thus urging him to do it, while another part of him is screaming at him to shrug it off, say it’s nothing, to hide. But he will not. Wringing his hands together, he took a deep breath and powered through the anxiety.

He told Midnighter everything, from the way he felt after what happened to him that day, to the way he acted all those years ago. He hid nothing. Apollo opened himself to other; “You don’t have to say anything, I just… I needed to tell you that.” He said, after he finished, and in the span of the half-minute silence that followed afterwards, his self-loathing was beginning to rear its ugly head and curse him to an eternity of consuming hatred of himself.

Still, there is a part of him that’s proud of himself, of what he did. Instead of focusing on the self-hatred, he focused on that part of himself.

Apollo felt, without seeing, the other shift. He felt the cold hand of Midnighter cradle the sides of his face, making him turn to look at the other. It was during these rare moments of their lives that the man finally lets his feelings show, and what Apollo sees in those hazel eyes is an array of emotions, from concern to anger to sadness, but most importantly what he sees is love. Pride.

It felt like a great burden was lifted off his chest and he could breathe again. ( when did he hold his breath? )

That night, they slept together with their limbs and hearts intertwined.

//

It took a very long time for him to get better, to let others help; instead of seeing pity, he saw sympathy.

There are days, though, where it all comes back to him, and he collapses from the weight. Those are the hardest days of his life.

//

The road is long, but he will get there. Because he promised himself that.


End file.
